Water treatment and waste management Petra Škabar, Slovenia

?  Sewage treatment is the process of removing contaminants from wastewater and household sewage, both runoff, domestic, commercial and institutional  Wastewater, also written as waste water, is any water that has been adversely affected in quality by anthropogenic influence.

How?  Any oxidizable material present in a natural waterway or in an industrial wastewater will be oxidized both by biochemical (bacterial) or chemical processes. The result is that the oxygen content of the water will be decreased.

Where?  In some urban areas, sewage is carried separately in sanitary sewers and runoff from streets is carried in storm drains. Access to either of these is typically through a manhole.  Sewage may drain directly into major watersheds with minimal or no treatment. When untreated, sewage can have serious impacts on the quality of an environment and on the health of people. Pathogens can cause a variety of illnesses

The use  Around 90% of wastewater produced globally remains untreated, causing widespread water pollution, especially in low-income countries. Increasingly, agriculture is using untreated wastewater for irrigation.  Cities provide lucrative markets for fresh produce, so are attractive to farmers. However, because agriculture has to compete for increasingly scarce water resources with industry and municipal users, there is often no alternative for farmers but to use water polluted with urban waste directly to water their crops.

In Slovenia  The beginnings of the construction of sewage treatment plants in major industrial centers in Slovenia date back to the years from 1970 to  Approximately 70% of the EU population is connected to the wastewater treatment plant. This proportion is highest in the Netherlands, where 99% of the population is connected to the waste water treatment plant. In Spain, Germany, Italy and Austria the share is 90%. The lowest proportion is in Malta, where only 13 % of the population is connected to the waste water treatment plant. According to data from 2010, this share amounts to 54% in Slovenia, which means that we are among the countries where the share of population connected to wastewater treatment plants is small and nearly half the population in Slovenia is still using cesspools

Waterwaste treatment plants in Slovenia

Sources  ulee_Dam_spillway.jpg ulee_Dam_spillway.jpg ulee_Dam_spillway.jpg  atment#Treatment atment#Treatment atment#Treatment  ergyenvironment/ pdf ergyenvironment/ pdf ergyenvironment/ pdf